No Ladder, But It's Still Eloping
by niver
Summary: /AU/ There they were, two guys in their late twenties, scarfing down fast food in a beat up old wreck of a car, on their way back from a sports game – and Naruto was proposing? /Narusasunaru/ /oneshot/


**No Ladder, But It's Still Eloping**

_Plop._

Uzumaki Naruto gave the piece of tomato in his lap an annoyed look, mumbling a curse through a mouthful of burger. Next to him, his ever-loving boyfriend, Uchiha Sasuke, slid his gaze to the wayward slice of fruit. "You pig."

Naruto forcibly swallowed the hunk of burger in one gulp, and snapped, "Shut up, asshole."

Sasuke smirked, taking a sip of his soda. "No, I don't think I will. You're a mess."

The blond glared once again at this, opened his mouth to shout something, before glittering, flashing lights caught his eye. Banter forgotten, he turned to face the windshield, watching as the building across from them was opened up for business for the night. Its neon lights were what caught his attention, proclaiming 'DRIVE-THRU CHAPEL' excitedly.

"Oi, Sasuke, check it." Sasuke, who had returned to his burger the moment Naruto's ADD kicked in, let his gaze follow Naruto's head jerk to the drive-through chapel across the street. Meanwhile, Naruto was torn between polishing off his dinner and grinning one of his super-charged grins. It was not a pretty sight, something Sasuke noted when he returned his attention to his boyfriend.

"A drive-through chapel. Fascinating. Stop the presses. I can't believe it--" Sasuke's monotone delivery was cut off by an impatient hand wave from Naruto.

"Yeah! It is! We should get married!" Naruto proudly exclaimed, punching a fist excitedly into the air. A glob of mayo joined the piece of tomato, but Naruto was too lost in his brilliant idea to care. Sasuke followed the arc of the mayo in silence, mind struggling to wrap itself around Naruto's unique brand of insanity. There they were, two guys in their late twenties, scarfing down fast food in a beat up old wreck of a car, on their way back from a sports game – and Naruto was proposing?

The idiot.

"Well, what do you think?" Naruto's eager blue eyes shone as he followed these words with the final bites of his burger. Sasuke did the same before replying, careful consideration going into what he would say.

"Hell no."

Naruto, however, was not one to be dissuaded by rejection. He started up the car and began the short drive to the chapel. Sasuke clenched a fist, trying to reign in his admittedly fiery temper. "I said no, stupid. That means I _don't want to._" The last part was a hiss. Naruto paused for the traffic, grinning aimlessly.

"You want to."

"Of course_ you_ understand my mind better than I do."

"Yep!"

Sasuke narrowed his eyes, nails digging into his palm. "Enlighten me. Why do I want to marry you?"

There was a pause as Naruto began to drive across the street, taking advantage of the red light. "Because you're going to spend the rest of your life with me anyways, might as well get some benefits from it."

Sasuke snorted. Admittedly, that was true. One of the only 'romantic' things he and Naruto had ever shared was Sasuke informing Naruto that he better start washing his socks, since Sasuke was in it for the long run and didn't want to choke and die on the stench before they had a chance to become grumpy old men taking pills to keep it up during grumpy old-man sex. "I'll give you that." As they reached the window of the drive-through and Naruto punched the button for assistance, Sasuke shrugged and settled back in defeat. "Fine. At least this way you won't try to get me in a dress."

Naruto got a wicked gleam in his eyes. "You sure? We could take a detour, get something pretty . . ."

Sasuke's reply was to give Naruto a punch to his smarmy face.

At that moment, a cough from the window indicated the arrival of the minister, and with Sasuke's fist still connected to Naruto's cheek, they both turned to face him. A delighted Naruto announced, "We're getting married!"

The minister, clearly a veteran at this business who had seen some truly bizarre things over the years, simply smiled and asked, "will you need us to supply a witness?"

"Sure, sure. Just hurry up before Sasuke here changes his mind and realizes he wants me to spring for a dress I just can't afford!" The minister nodded and disappeared into the gloom of the building, while an offended Sasuke and cheerful Naruto engaged in a short tussling match with lots of elbowing and swearing.

Before long, the minister returned with a witness in tow, coughing once again to catch the attention of the struggling men. Naruto, who had ended up with his head hanging out the window and Sasuke's pale hands wrapped around his neck while a sneakered foot wedged up against Sasuke's shoulder, smiled at the two at the chapel window. "We–" he paused to hack a little, and Sasuke let up the pressure "–don't have rings, that okay?"

The minister shrugged. "They're not needed. For a fee we can supply them."

Sasuke spoke to the minister for the first time. "No rings. I'm not a goddamn pet that needs to be tagged."

Naruto nodded, or as best as he could in his current position. "He won't stray. Besides, I dunno if I could afford it. The only cash I have on me will pay for this quickie wedding." He had responsibly noted the price driving in, and was thankful he hadn't gotten fries as well because he wouldn't have made the cut then. He already knew well enough that Sasuke would refuse to hack up any money for something that was Naruto's idea.

The minister coughed once again, eying them. "Well, if you give us that money now we can start the proceedings." Naruto jerked a head in acknowledgment, before beginning his awkward maneuvering for his wallet. Sasuke did nothing to help, hands still idly pressed to Naruto's throat as if just waiting for Naruto to say another irritating thing. Naruto did not comply however, pulling out his wallet and performing a strange dance of limbs to tug out the bills. These he handed up to the minister, who counted them quickly before smiling.

"Looks like we can start. Now what are your names . . ?"

Naruto and Sasuke's marriage went smoothly from that point on, and marriage license in hand they registered at a government office before heading back home for a two day honeymoon that rarely left the bedroom. By the time they finally emerged the whole thing didn't seem like that a big a deal anymore, as their relationship hadn't really changed, and so as time went by it wasn't the forefront of their thoughts.

The result of this was that none of their friends or family were ever informed.

_**19 Years Later**_

Sakura eyed her grey hairs in the reflection with a sigh. Pushing forty-six, married, with two wonderful children, she often felt like she was at an impasse at her life. Well, she was older, but she had done things. Matured gracefully, gotten her happily-ever-after, things weren't too bad.

At least she wasn't those two boneheads, Naruto and Sasuke.

As if on cue, the doorbell rang, and she moved to open the front door. Standing on the other side were her two idiot best friends, casually dressed. Boneheads or not, she had to admit that they had definitely grown up handsome. Very different from the pretty and cute appearance they had sported back in the day. Smiling fondly at the memories, she let them in, exchanging hellos as she shut the door.

They moved into the living room, taking seats, as Naruto and Sasuke continued an argument they had probably started on the way to Sakura's house over something completely pointless.

"I tell you, the traffic lights have gotten faster."

"No, you've gotten slower."

"Rich, coming from your slow ass!"

"Hn."

"Don't you make that noise at me! You know I hate it."

Sakura sighed. Sure, they had grown up, but in some ways they were still the same. She didn't care if bickering was their way of flirting. They had been dating for twenty-three years, they could at least learn the beauty of a silent moment. As her thoughts turned this way, a thought that had been nagging at her finally made itself known. "Why aren't you two married? All this time dating, you might as well make everything official."

For some reason, Naruto smirked at this non-sequitur interruption while Sasuke rolled his eyes, presumably at his partner's cat-got-the-canary expression. "We never told you?"

Sakura eyed them warily. "Told me what? Are you two broken up?"

"No, no, we're married!"

Sakura's jaw dropped. "Bullshit."

Naruto wagged a finger at her. "Mrs. Sakura, what if the children heard?"

"They're at a party." She responded automatically, before her brain fully caught up with what Naruto had announced. "No way. When? Where? What?"

Sasuke spoke up at that point, mostly to make sure his husband didn't exaggerate the story. "Something like . . . nineteen years ago. We were eating after a game, and he got the idea that we should use the drive-through chapel across the street."

Sakura stared. "You agreed to that?" 

At that point, Naruto cut in. "It took some wheedling, but yes he did. So, we were married. End of story."

"No, this is not the end of the story!" snapped Sakura, eyes narrowing. "Why didn't you tell anyone?" She waited for the answer, mind conjuring up hundreds of possibilities, each weirder than the last.

Naruto gave her his trademarked grin, casually waving his hand. "It never came up."

At this, Sakura's mind seemed to short-circuit. "It . . . never . . . came up?" Suddenly she rose to her feet. "At every single damn wedding we attended you didn't consider it a related topic?!" she thundered, hurt that they hadn't thought to let their best friend in on the secret.

"No one asked us if we eloped." Sasuke stated dryly, observing the state of Sakura's dying chrysanthemum. Sakura gaped with impotent rage, unable to even compose a single sentence in response to Sasuke's flat point. Finally, with a huff, she retook her seat and glared at the duo, her mind desperately grabbing at something to say.

"No rings?" she finally asked weakly, watching their noticeably bare hands. Naruto's eyes lighted up.

"Way back when, Sasuke here said something about how he didn't want to get tagged like a pet." The blond chuckled at the recollection. Sasuke stared at Naruto in disbelief.

"You can remember that far back? For the first time in all these years, I'm impressed." Before Naruto could use this as an excuse to start another round of petty squabbling, Sakura held up a hand.

"Just . . . stop. I'm already quite upset with you two for keeping this to yourselves, so don't make it worse by giving me a headache." She leaned back into her low seat, closing her eyes tiredly.

"We're sorry, Sakura. We didn't mean for you to feel excluded." Naruto said diplomatically. Sakura reopened her eyes, frowning in annoyance at the pair, though it was belied by her softening eyes.

"You better hope you didn't," she grumbled, but added, "congratulations, you two."

Naruto grabbed Sasuke's hand, too tightly for the other to pull away – Sasuke hated public displays of affection, even if the only 'public' was their friend – and grinned charmingly. "Thanks, Sakura. That means a lot."

"Oh, don't get over confident," Sakura muttered, smiling slightly. "I still hate you for this."

Naruto shrugged smilingly, allowing Sasuke to reclaim his hand. "Funny, Sasuke said the same thing after we got married."

**The End**

**AN: To any Thumbtack readers, it isn't forgotten, though the update I _wanted_ to use has been lost and I'm stuck with the suckier one. Anywho, this story. My friend and I were just discussing the overwhelming amount of sugar-sweet marriage fics and lack of "whatevs let's just do it" elopement fics, which we agreed suit Naruto and Sasuke very well. So here's my contribution. **

**Thoughts?**


End file.
